The years 1940 through 1980 tend to be overlooked in the art market but were in fact instrumental. According to the National Endowment of the Arts (NEA), 45% of art museums were created between 1940 and 1975. Reasons for both for-profit and non-for-profit art sectors’ expansion are numerous. For one, the opening of university art museums arose with universities’ desire to relay humanist values to students by exposing them to the visual arts. The subsequent boom in MFA students (increasing from 525/year in 1950 to 8,708/year in 1980), art centers throughout the country and government funding effectively functioned as a positive feedback loop: the proliferation of these centers and museums stimulated public interest which in turn vindicated the continual growth of government and corporate art funds.
Additionally, beginning in the mid-1960s, federal and state governments, corporations and foundations began further supporting the arts as a whole. Created in 1965, the NEA’s budget increased from $1.8 million in 1966 to $131 million in 1983. During Carter’s presidency from 1977–1981, specifically, the arts were perceived at both federal and state levels as socially beneficial, providing heightened meaning in life. The arts also created jobs, encouraged higher learning among the masses, and supported “high culture.”
Further, corporations began augmenting their art collections with rapid museum development. This was partly to deflect the criticism of commercialism inherent in US culture, and to rather underscore humanitarian initiatives. Corporate spending thus increased from $22 million to $436 million from 1966 to 1983. Of the 67% corporate collections listed in Catell’s American Art Directory (1982), 93% were created after 1940. Enormous growth in all aspects of the art market including its organizational infrastructure occurred during this forty-year period, particularly during the latter half. In fact, by the 1980s many artists were earning enough money to be considered middle or even upper class.
Along with the booming US economy under Reagan and Thatcher’s privatization of nationalized industries in Britain, these social shifts culminated in the decline of conceptualism and its protest to consumerism. The late 1970s and early 1980s were also marked by the “Pictures Generation” artists, including Robert Longo, Sherrie Levine, Barbara Kruger and Cindy Sherman. In a world that for the first time had 24-hour television, both artists and the public began seeing the world through a lens of media: “American culture was Hollywood and movies. From this came, artist as celebrity,” says arts writer Diana Crane.
With this material-driven eco-system also came a new marriage of fashion — a field built on luxury and consumerism — and fine art, that which also represents luxury, but accompanied by taste, knowledge, and culture. The bonding of the two, however, typified a considerable risk of quality dilution of art, namely contemporary art. Even some museums have realized the financial potential from this collaboration. For instance, at the Fall 2007 Murakami retrospective at LAMOCA, entitled Ó Murakami, curator Paul Schimmel hosted a Louis Vuitton boutique within the exhibition. For sale were $960 handbags featuring Murakami’s celebrated cherry blossoms and fruit as well as the “jellyfish eye” marked with the LV logo. Damien Hirst, who has arguably reached the pinnacle of “artist as celebrity / entrepreneur” has even created his own clothing line with Alexander McQueen; Richard Prince also partnered with Louis Vuitton to create the €10,000 limited edition Jamais handbag.
Additionally, just as the production of fashion is mechanized, so too has some blue chip contemporary art become mechanized. Although there is far less complexity regarding authenticity and attribution in the contemporary art market than with older works, there is growing production mechanization making some contemporary works increasingly reproducible. Jeff Koons’ catalogues, for instance, comprise images of works that have yet to be created. One may simply order an artwork as if ordering a garment online. This production method arguably inspired Hirst’s creation of the Golden Calf (2008), which is itself rooted in mockery of the contemporary art world — a notion that was evidenced by its sale of $18.6 million.
Indeed, artists such as Murakami, Hirst, or Prince, can earn more wealth from fashion house affiliations than from artwork sales. Likewise, a fashion brand’s association with fine art bolsters the status attached, thus allowing for increased prices on goods. But fashion and art are collaborating to a degree far beyond individual artist ventures. This proliferation has even extended to museums exhibitions, as noted, in addition to those such as the 2011 Alexander McQueen show, Savage Beauty at the Met, Christian Dior’s Designer of Dreams at The Brooklyn Museum and at Victoria and Albert in London.
One may argue that with the increased commercialization of some art comes inflated prices and thus less accessibility to the art, including museums’ acquisitions of this work . That being said,
NOTES:
A few years ago it seemed to me that the winner-take-all economy that is taking over in so many places was going to triumph in the art world. If it wasn’t a Damien Hirst or a Richard Prince Nurse, forget it! Well, it didn’t happen. Suddenly there was a lot of energy among dealers working with younger artists. Collectors are more diverse than the number crunchers think. They don’t all want the same thing. And there’s enough of them to support a lot of art galleries and a lot of artists.